Box Office: A perfect guy comes for a visit
Sunday, September 13, 2015 at 5:00PM 
Tim here with your box office report for this quiet autumn weekend. Or not. In fact, coming on the heels of a fairly slow August and and absolutely soporific Labor Day, this weekend was kind of unbelievably big, with both of the week's major releases managing to overperform quite a bit beyond all but the very rosiest of expectations. It was a photo finish to see who ended up in the #1 slot
WEEKEND TOP 10, ESTIMATED
01 The Perfect Guy $26.7 new
02 The Visit $25.7 new
03 War Room $7.4 (cum. $39.2)
04 A Walk in the Woods $4.6 (cum. $19.9) Reviewed at Sundance
05 Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation $4.2 (cum. $188.2) Tim's Review
06 Straight Outta Compton $4.1 (cum. $155.7) Podcast
07 No Escape $2.9 (cum. $24.2)
08 The Transporter Refueled $2.7 (cum. $13.3)
09 90 Minutes in Heaven $2.2 new
10 Un Gallo con Muchos Huevos $1.9 (cum. $6.7)
That's quite an achievement for both of the top openers. The Perfect Guy becomes the third film with African-American leads in a row, over five consecutive weeks, to take the #1 spot. Before we get too excited about the nascent sea change in American pop culture, it should be pointed out that next week, all of those films are going to be beaten by, among other releases, a movie in which Johnny Depp plays a character with the actual name "Whitey". Still, it's a stark reminder that there's a big audience for movies where the cast isn't all full of Nordic gods, and maybe that audience would even be around anytime that's not the hinterlands of early September.
The other release, The Visit, meanwhile finds famous and infamous thriller-maker M. Night Shyamalan being handed the keys to maybe, perhaps, let himself out of director jail. The film received less than luminous reviews, but they still look rosy and loving compared to his recent spate of much-despised misfires: 56 on Metacritic, and 62% on Rotten Tomatoes, Shyamalan's first Fresh movie since 2002's Signs. Moreover, produced on a shoestring, apparently with much of the director's own money, The Visit has already turned a profit. No, it's not The Sixth Sense, but it's a definite upswing in Shyamalan's fortunes any way you look at it.
For myself, I've seen neither of them, though I did finally catch up with Straight Outta Compton this weekend. Since I'm boring, let me kick it over to the audience: What did you watch this weekend?
Reader Comments (19)
"The Visit" was flawed but a lot of fun, helped by the fact that the whole cast is aces. The lead girl, Olivia DeJonge, has a very poised, young Kirsten Dunst vibe. And I would watch Kathryn Hahn in anything at this point.
I also caught up with "Unfriended" which totally works on its own terms; it also felt thoroughly black-hearted and pessimistic, relying much more on psychological stakes than I expected.
Over/Unders for Next Week?
Black Mass: $15-22 million.
Captive: $8-16 million.
Everest: $25-30 million.
Maze Runner 2: $20-25 million.
Pawn Sacrifice: $8-10 million.
Sicario: $18-22 million.
Volvagia,
Of those, only Black Mass and Maze Runner are opening in wide release. Everest and Captive look to be semi-wide and the rest are limited. Given that, I'll say
Maze Runner - 38
Black Mass - 17
Perfect Guy - 10.5
The Visit - 9.5
War Room/Everest/Captive - 4 - 5 each.
"The Visit" which yes in an improvement on Shyamalan's last disasters. I wish he would have revealed the big twist earlier and used for suspense and I still have problems with the found footage genre ( if you are running for your life are you still going to be filming?!) but to be fair the movie was fun in a cheap haunted house way- and had a couple of decent scares.
I watched "I'll See You in My Dreams" and was completely charmed by it. I hope that Blythe Danner will still be in the conversation come nominations morning. Her Carol was fully realized and complex. In the sequence she shares with Malin Akerman, Danner comes through with such realism and aching and hurt - it just broke my heart. The film is so graceful and (yes) mature in the manner in which it exposes the complexities of aging.
I was surprised (pleasantly!) when i checked the TFE music predictions page to find the eponymous song (so wonderfully sung by Martin Starr in the film) already on Nat's predictions. It's a poignant use of song in film - and made me tear up just a touch :)
Saw Straight Outta and can see F the Police as a 1st amendment issue like burning the flag.
They sure had a tough time w managers. Have read about omission of Dr.Dre's violence against women--and his profound apology. I guess we don't have impulse control completely until over 25? And of course he grew in an extremely violent area.
There is no excuse for Dre beating up a female reporter. None.
I saw the Steve Jobs documentary and it's quite good.
I saw two films in theatres and one at home.
The Visit: Hilarious and very creepy, yet the emotional arc is entirely clichéd, unnecessary, and awkward.
Woman In Gold: They must have lost the gold somewhere.
Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation : Great fun, yet I kept wondering if there's a female quota on these films. That would be the only reason they didn't bring the amazing Paula Patton back. Imagine the possibilities with Paula Patton AND Rebecca Ferguson. Ugh, missed opportunity.
I finally saw THE DIARY OF A TEENAGE GIRL and loved loved loved it. Put Powley, Wiig and Saarsgard into the awards conversation, please.
Finally got around to watching Black Mirror. If the rest of the series is as good as the first two episodes, I will be in binge ecstasy.
Here's a little box office fun fact. If the Sunday estimates are accurate, Inside Out just passed Furious 7 and has become the third highest-grossing film of 2015 domestically, while Minions is still about $20 million behind (which in terms of box office reciepts isn't much, I know). It's funny because I remember when Minions came out, Tim predicted that it would out-gross Inside Out "because there is nothing good" (quotation from his July 2015 Movie Preview). I'm guessing this is one of those cases where, unless Minions catches up in the next few weeks (which is not looking very likely), Tim will be happy to have been wrong and be able to believe in something good (on the domestic front at least, I know worldwide Minions is way ahead, but then again it got a head-start in most territories)...
The Visit is good. Silly, but has enough jolting scares to make up for it. The awful pre-pubescent white boy rapping is unforgivable though. I've never hated anything Shyamalan has done though (except After Earth) so I was happy to see his own self-funded film do well. I tend to find many of the jokes made about him and his films rather unnecessary - how often do we openly wish films were more surprising - and this one is effective.
Straight Outta Compton, which I saw today, is an interesting case. It says a lot about cinema in general as well as music that a film can feel so vital and electric and ultimately essential despite being so adherent to the biopic blueprint. The actors are all great and the sound design is particularly worth of an Oscar nomination.
The Visit is indeed a partial return to form for Shyamalan, whose films are always best and most focused when they're smaller, more intimate, and more relational -- though I'm still in the minority who enjoy his more ambitious efforts like Lady in the Water and The Happening. Someone get Kathryn Hahn a headlining movie gig.
Dave S., Unfriended is undoubtedly a much better movie in execution that it seemed to be on paper, and what appeared to be a gimmick (telling the story through social media technology) works to surprising effectiveness.
"Goodnight, Mommy". I'm afraid to say anything about this film since its best if you go to see it without knowing much or anything at all, but everyone needs to see it. don't read reviews, synopsis and do not watch trailers for it.
Paul Outlaw: They aren't.
UNFRIENDED is great. Not even kidding when I say it's one of my favourites of the year so far.
Finally saw Happy-Go-Lucky, and was blown away by Sally's performance. She performed a rather neat little trick: Making someone nice eminently watchable. Leigh pulled off the suspenseful final act with aplomb.
Watched Recount and thought it was an expert thriller, with Laura Dern scary good. Speaking of which, also finished the first half of Season 2 of Enlightened. I am heartbroken this series didn't stick around longer. What a lovely and unique take on activism and hopefulness.
I saw "Good Night Mommy" this weekend. It was perfectly creepy and disturbing but I'm really surprised that this is Austria's entry for Best Foriegn Language Film. The film is well made and the performances areb really great however it's still a pretty standard horror flick. I find it hard to believe this is the best that country had to offer to the Academy.
@brookesboy - funny you mentioned that, because I just started Enlightened this weekend and am 4 episodes in and looooooooove it. The show and Dern are so good!
I also finally watched I Am Love because I needed some Italy porn and the film did not disappoint (and actually came close to being porn, which I did not expect). Swinton is, of course, fanfastic, and it's such a strange, interesting, beautiful film.